Adoni Taluk
This article has been extracted from THE IMPERIAL GAZETTEER OF INDIA , 1908. OXFORD, AT THE CLARENDON PRESS. |
Note: National, provincial and district boundaries have changed considerably since 1908. Typically, old states, ‘divisions’ and districts have been broken into smaller units, units, and many tahsils upgraded to districts.Many units have since been renamed. Therefore, this article is being posted mainly for its historical value.
Adoni Taluk
Northernmost taluk of Bellary District, Madras, lying between 15 degree 30' and 15 degree 58' N. and 76 degree 56' and 77 degree 38' E., with an area of 839 square miles. The population in 1901 was 178,784, compared with 160,795 in 1891. It contains three towns, Adoni (population, 30,416), the head-quarters, Yemmiganur (13,890), and Kosigi (7,748) ; and 191 villages. The demand for land revenue and cesses amounted in 1903-4 to Rs. 3,44,000. With the taluks of Alur, Bellary, and Rayadrug, Adoni forms the great level eastern plain of the District, most of which is covered with fertile black cotton soil and is broken only by a few scattered rocky eminences. Cotton, cholam (Sorghum vulgare), and korra (Setaria italica) are the principal crops, and the soil is the best in the District after Alur, the assessment on unirrigated land averaging 14 annas an acre.
The crops are, however, almost entirely dependent upon rainfall, only 1 per cent, of the total area, most of which is supplied by wells, being protected from drought in all seasons. It is thus extremely liable to scarcity, and suffered very severely in the great famine of 1876-8, when one-third of the inhabi- tants perished from starvation or disease.
